By the time you read this
(according to those who ought
to know) the QL will be
available in the shops and mail
order will have ceased. Sinclair
Research has realised that,
after all the cock-ups, it just
had to make it available on the
high street shelves before
Christmas to stand any chance
of selling in quantity. However,
there won't be that many -
Nigel Searle has admitted that
"demand will exceed supply",
for both the QL and the flat-
screen TV (which is being
retailed at the same time). The
flat-screen TV is an even
longer running saga than the
QL. It was launched just under
a year,ago and only a few have
been sold by the notorious mail
order (potential customers
were spared the heavyweight
advertising campaign). At least
early deliveries have shown
that the device isn't bug-
ridden!
We should, in theory, have
seen the last of the kludged
QLs. As I write this, the first
customers are being given the
opportunity of sending their
prototypes back to the
Camberley mailing house for
upgrading. The whole process
is 'guaranteed' to take less than

10 days, though what happens
if it takes any longer is not
specified. Although the
upgrade actually only takes
about five minutes to complete,
the 10-day stipulation is a
result of the QLs being
returned to the 'wrong' place.
The Camberley office takes the
machines and bundles them off
to Thorn EMI - which
accounts for at least some of
the 10 days.
The User Guide supplied at
present makes hilarious
reading to anyone who knows
anything at all about Basic -
it's packed with misprints and
general inaccuracies. Wags
have been hazarding that the
thick tome must have been
proof read by a one-eyed
Norwegian (No offence to our
Norwegian readers. Ed.) in a
dimly lit room. It's clear that as
the Basic was changing so
rapidly, the authors of the
manual didn't really know what
was included in the machine
and what was not. The result is
that many commands are
inaccurately described, and
several arc missing altogether.
Early QL owners have not just
been used as a development
facility for the machine, but
also as proof readers!
After a long battle, it's been

decided that the QL is not to
become the next BBC micro.
It's been an uncertain couple of
months, but at last the Beeb
has decided to stick with
Acorn's rapidly ageing device
and its promised processor
add-ons. In many ways, the
decision is curious. The QL has
most of the hardware/software
qualifications of the Model B,
as well as being launched with a
bug-ridden O/S, long delivery
delays and accompanied by the
non-appearance of promised
peripherals - all quite
reminiscent of the Beeb's own
machine.
A company called GST was
commissioned last year to write
an operating system for a
machine that was to become
the QL. This it did, but
eventually it was decided not to
use the end result and Sinclair
Research's own O/S was
chosen instead. GST is now
going to be selling its product
as an alternative to QDOS. The
reason, it transpires, for the
refusal was that GST had
exceeded the memory limit by
about 2k - ironic considering
that Sinclair Research itself was
exceeding the limit by a huge
9K by the time of release!

Q L A F F A I R SPresented by Leon Heller, Chairman of the Independent QL Users Group (IQLUG).

.

WORD ON QDOS

Users curious about how the
QL works can get a full set of
documentation for £35
(inclusive) from QJUMP,
nn xxxx xxxxxx, xxxxxxx,
xxxxxxxxx xxn nxx.
QJUMP is Tony Tebby, who
wrote QDOS for Sinclair. He's
now left Sinclair Research and
has acquired the distribution
rights to the QL
documentation. Be warned!
The documentation will not be
of much use to you unless you
are an experienced MC68000
assembly language
programmer! You also need
access to a MC68000
assembler or cross-assembler;
hand-assembly of MC68000
code is not recommended if
you value your sanity!
Incidentally, I managed to
get a copy of the QDOS
documentation out of Sinclair
Research, and it is quite
excellent, which is more than
can be said for some of the
books published on the QL.

.

QLUB SPACE

The QL User's Bureau
(QLUB), Sinclair Research's
much-vaunted users' group for
the QL has at last managed to
produce its first newsletter,
entitled QLUB News. It's a
slim document, comprising of
just four pages, and a large
proportion of this 'magnus
opus' consists of blank space.
Sinclair Research invites
contributions from QLUB

members and asks that letters
be kept as brief as possible -
presumably so that it can
maintain an editorial policy of
50 per cent text and 50 per cent
space in subsequent issues!

.

GOOD CONNECTIONS

There are those who would
wish to use an RGB colour
monitor with their QL, and
who are encountering some
difficulty in making up a
suitable cable (they don't seem
to be available from Sinclair
Research yet). The hard-to-get
eight-pin DIN plugs are
obtainable from: Maplin
Electronic Supplies Ltd, xx
xxxn, xxxxxxxx, xxxxx xxn
nxx. The code to order is:
FG40T (DIN Plug 8-pin) TQ
100; and the price is a mere
62p each. In fact, they're still
hard-to-get since Maplin is out
of stock as I write this, but at
least you now know another
source to order them from
when supplies become
plentiful.

.

SOFT UPDATE

Bristol software house
Metacomco is producing a
range of languages for the QL.
Its first offering is likely to be
an assembler and editor,
followed by BCPL and C
compilers ... and, for when the
0.5M memory expansion
materialises, a LISP
interpreter. They'll probably
sell for around £100 each.

Sagesoft has completed its
accounting software to run on
the QL, the result to be
marketed by Sinclair Research.
The whole caboodle is likely to
be quite expensive, however.
For some inexplicable
reason, the software is not
integrated with the Psion suite.

.

TERMINAL STUFF

Member of IQLUG, Jeremy
San, has written a terminal
emulation program for the QL
which will shortly be placed in
the group's software library.
Written in assembly language,
the program's being 'tarted up'
to allow the uploading and
downloading of Microdrive
files. Because of the limitations
of the QL serial ports, Jeremy's
been unable to make the
program function satisfactorily
with the standard 1200/75
baud Prestel service, but it
works fine with a standard 300
baud modem for accessing
computerised bulletin boards.

.

ANYONE FOR UNIX?

Sinclair Research is thinking
seriously about putting the
UNIX operating system on the
QL. UNIX has hitherto been
available only on minis and up-
market micros like the Fortune.
The QL will need the 0.5M
RAM expansion and a sizeable
hard disk (30M or so), but the
move could make the QL a
very popular machine with the
universities.